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We already know it as "that one day in September". Now, stand by for "that one week in September". That's what's in store this year with word reaching us that the AFL tomorrow will sign off on arrangements to make the 2004 grand final week a bigger week of celebrations than ever before. The linchpin is a massive party planned for the city on the Wednesday night, until now the only day of that week that did not include a highlight, alongside Brownlow Medal night (Monday), the 200 Club and Carbine Club (Tuesday), The Footy Show (Thursday), the grand final parade (Friday) and the grand final (Saturday). And this will be no ordinary party.

With Myer tipped to have the naming rights, the spectacular evening will be a strictly invitation-only affair, with league officials understood to be already preparing their own special A-list of guests, which will be made up of a who's who of the footy world. With the evening's planning still in its infancy, the league is yet to decide on who will provide the entertainment (but don't expect it to be a mainstream big-name).

A venue is also still to be chosen, although commercial operations manager Gillon McLachlan is believed to have looked at three likely sites - a Docklands warehouse, the Hall of Fame and Sensation at the QV building and a third location in Little Collins Street.

Now, the Sandra and Jo Show

And if you want glitz and glamour in grand final week, how about this. With Brownlow evening already footy's night of nights, it, too, is about to get even bigger, from Channel Ten's perspective anyway, with the finals network planning to screen a live, half-hour, red carpet special completely separate from the count.

Under its joint AFL agreement, Nine and Ten take turns to telecast the Brownlow and with 2004 being Ten's turn, it has pencilled in glamorous news reader Sandra Sully and former Sale of the Century hostess Jo Bailey (pictured, inset), wife of former Carlton champion Stephen Silvagni, to co-host the program.

Concentrating solely on the night's fashion, the program will be screened from 7pm-7.30pm and will be then followed by a one-hour Australian Idol episode before the medal count starts at 8.30pm.

Up there, Joe Cocker!

Joe Cocker is already part of the Australian rules vernacular, with 3AW's Rex Hunt using the legendary and controversial pop idol to occasionally describe a player as flying higher than him for a mark. Well, we now learn the English singer may have been the inspiration behind footy's greatest song as well. Singer and songwriter Mike Brady will this week release a book entitled Up There Mike Brady, in which he reveals why and how the song, Up There Cazaly, was written in the 1970s. Because of the success of cricket's C'mon Aussie C'Mon to help launch World Series Cricket, Channel Seven commissioned Brady to come up with a footy equivalent to upstage it. According to Brady, he and some music industry friends were watching a new video starring Cocker that was part of an ad campaign to "get wrecked" on Great Keppel Island. Sipping a few long-necked beers and tossing around some tentative thoughts while the Cocker video was playing, Brady suddenly said: "I know what we need - Up There Cazaly", further telling them about a pre-war footballer named Roy Cazaly and garbled stories he heard about him from the nuns at St Joseph's school in Port Melbourne. The rest, as they say, is history. The book will be launched on Wednesday, complete with appearances by Alex Jesaulenko and Ray Shaw, the Carlton and Collingwood captains of the 1979 grand final, during which Up There Cazaly was sung for the first time.

Nine's oops Mk II Channel Nine sporting glitches just keep coming. Hot on the heels of its cricket controversy last week when it screened The Price is Right instead of the Test match from Cairns and consequently missed televising Shane Warne equalling the world Test wicket record, now its golf coverage has come under fire. Seems that because last Thursday night's Footy Show went over time (now there's a surprise), Nine didn't cross to the opening round of the British Open until after midnight instead of its scheduled cross of 11.30pm, when Tiger Woods and Greg Norman had just teed off. The only trouble was, under its contractual agreement with Foxtel, the pay TV network was allowed to screen the golf until 11.30pm but no later, meaning that for more than half an hour, there was no coverage anywhere. We are told Nine's switchboards in Sydney and Melbourne lit up as angry fans voiced their disapproval.

Kid, got a job for you

To top it off, when they finally did start coverage, the positioning of Nine's station logo obscured the full leaderboard scores. The switchboard lit up again so the station had to keep a junior on until 4am with the sole task of pressing a button to remove the station logo every time the BBC (from whom Nine was taking the feed) showed the scores.

Capping off a fine career Who said umpires and referees are dumb, ignorant and uneducated so and so's? Meet Pierluigi Collina, the Italian who refereed the 2002 World Cup soccer final. The reason for him wearing that funny hat is that he has just been conferred with an honorary doctorate in sport science from the University of Hull in northern England. If nothing else, at least it will keep his famous bald head warm.

Who said that?

"Anyone who says this is fun is joking and they're having a laugh. This is not fun and this is not enjoyment. This is a job and a horrible one." - COLIN MONTGOMERIE, despite being among the leaders in the third round of the British Open.